Saturday, September 10, 2011

4.25 miles RUN!

Today was my long run on the Jeff Galloway plan. I guess getting up to 7.5 miles walking this summer really helped because it wasn't hard really at all. I thought I would be struggling after the 3rd mile but I really wasn't. I did take it easier and didn't push my walk or run paces. Though I my run paces turned out to be faster than I was planning on.

I did miss one of my turns and had to take a slightly round about route to get back on my planned route. It was supposed to only be 4.1 miles or so. Oh well, at least I caught it early enough so I didn't add an extra mile or have to backtrack.

It was a great run though. I ran 4.25 miles in 55:16.74 with an average pace of 13:00 minutes per mile. I really thought I would be ruined by the end of it but I was just exhilarated. A good run to follow up tripping on my last run.

I only jarred my left knee once or twice. It didn't really bother me at all.

Feetwise I am doing really good. No new painful blisters. I now have a very small blister on my right foot in the same spot as my left inside blister. I think that is a sign I need new shoes but I would like to make them last the rest of the month. A friend of mine suggested that part of my blister problem might be a strange allergic reaction (his wife has something similar when she rides her bike) and I should try antihistamines. I was dubious as I am already on allergy meds so that shouldn't be a problem. But I decided to try adding one benadryl pill before I run. I don't know if it is working or if the cooler weather is helping but nothing big or painful has popped up so far. I guess I will keep trying it until I do get more blisters. It may just be I need higher mileage to test this theory correctly. After all I did seem to have gotten my feet conditioned for 3 mile runs. I wasn't having many problems with those recently. So only time will tell.

Next week two 30-45 minute runs (aka a 3.1 mile run) and a 2 mile run. That may turn into a 3 mile run since I did so well on my 4 miles. 2 miles seems really short to me. heh! Never thought I would say that.

Catching up 9/8

This was not a fun run. I came home from work and had a snack. Then I waited around until the air cooled off. So once again I was running at dusk. I left the house and a had a decent 2.5 miles of running and walking. But then I stumbled and didn't catch myself at the last half mile mark. I went down on my hands and knees. I hit pretty hard on my knees and skinned both of them pretty bad. It hurt landing on my hands but the next day they were fine so I obviously didn't go down that hard. I was running, not walking, at the time so that made is suck more. I got up, checked my knees sort of and got back to finishing my 1 minute of running. I decided I had to get home no matter what and I wasn't gushing blood so I finished my run. Even doing one more run interval before walking the rest of the way home. It may have slowed me down just a little because my time and average pace a weird. But I finished and got home to take care of my knees.

I ran 3.13 miles in 40:04:65 with an average pace of 12:48 minutes per mile. That is what I mean by slightly weird time and average pace. My time is slower than my first run of the month but my average pace is faster. Oh well. I did it and I got home.

I got home, dragged out my ibuprofen and went into the bathroom to clean my knees. Luckily, I was only just starting to have a drip run down my left leg from my knee so I wasn't bleeding horribly. I hydrogen peroxided both knees and then slapped lots of Neosporin with pain relief on my band aids. Sadly, I still hadn't had dinner yet and was starving. I decided to order some pizza while I iced my knees.

I think I did everything right because today my knees are looking much better. The bruising is finally coming up but the skinned parts are looking very healthy and are healing. I managed to keep some of the swelling down, though by the time I got home I had a good goose egg on my left knee. Still I think I did a good job taking care of my knees.

Catching up 9/6

Mike and I went for a run on 9/6 together. He was leaving the next day for the Maldives and is now gone for the month so we were spending as much time as possible together. It was a good run. Somehow trying to run and talk to Mike made my heart beat slower instead of faster like it was supposed to do. Very weird.

But talking to him made my run go so much faster. We each had music in one ear and were just chatting. I thought it made it harder but we also ran faster than I normally do on each run interval. And I was okay at the end. So that was good. We did walk a little slower than I normally do as Mike has a hard time keeping up with me for two minutes. I forgot to mention in the last post that I went back down to a 1 minute run 2 minute walk interval. I didn't want to start my Jeff Galloway plan off to hard. Though I think after these last few runs that on my shorter runs I will switch to 1 minute run 1:30 walk and see if I can get down to 1 minute 1 minute. At least until 1 minute 1:30 gets easy I will stick to 1 minute run and 2 minutes walk for my longer runs. Since I have never actually run more than 3.14 miles or so.

Mike and I ran 3.12 miles in 40:31.44 with an average pace of 13:00 minutes per mile. Not too shabby.


Catching up 9/2

Yes, I know I have been bad. I didn't run or walk for almost a month. I had a blister and IFGS games and I got a job. (Guess I need to update my about me) So I went for my first run in a while on 9/2. I was supposed to run earlier than that and I guess I failed my first Jeff Galloway week. Luckily, it was just three 3 mile runs. So I wasn't missing much. Mike had to be pretty forceful to get me to run that day. It wasn't bad.

I went the opposite way on my 3 mile route. That was weird but since I was running at dusk I wanted to be sure I had enough light at the end. So I did the neighborhoods first and then came down Spine Rd which has businesses on it. Better for light even if there aren't many street lights. Turned out I didn't need to worry too much as it wasn't that dark out when I got home.

The run sort of sucked because a half mile in I really had to pee. So I had to hold it through the rest of the run. Not fun at all. Oh well.

I did 3.1 miles in 39:43.65 with an average pace of 12:49 minutes per mile. Not too shabby for having taken a month off.